Audience:
Cindy Thamrin:
We're just waiting for a few more people to trickle in.
OK, great. I think we might make a start. We've got an exciting program ahead of us, so good to get started. Good morning, good day, everyone. Thank you all for attending today's webinar from Research to Translation on the Dementia Ageing and Aged Care Mission.
I'm Associate Professor Cindy Thamrin. I am a Director and Principal Research Scientist from the Health and Medical Research Office in the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing, which is also the office that administers the Medical Research Future Fund (as well as the Mission).
I'll begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the lands on which we're virtually meeting today. I'm based in Perth, or Boorloo, on the lands of the Whadjuk Noongar people. I acknowledge and pay respects to their continuing culture and the contribution that they make to the life of this city and this region. I also want to acknowledge the lands that our respective speakers are coming from today, Wadawurrung (Geelong), Walgalu (Queanbeyan) and Ngunnawal (Canberra) Country and extend that acknowledgement and respect to other families with a connection to those regions, and also to any other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who are here with us today.
So, you should see on your screen the list of speakers and panel that we have with us today. This is the second webinar that we're hosting of the theme from Research to Translation that has been organized by the Health and Medical Research Office and our aim with these webinars are not just to communicate the aims of the MRFF's Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission and its grant opportunities and how we work to improve the Mission, but we also want to find ways to encourage translation of the research that we fund. So, in these webinars, we hope to do this by having policy makers present to researchers, what are the government priorities that are relevant to the areas of research, as well as real world considerations for translating policy into practice.
And as some of you may be aware already, dementia in particular has been in the national spotlight recently when Professor Henry Brodaty highlighted the importance of research at the National Press Club in Canberra. And those of you who haven't had the chance to check out that address yet, I encourage you to look it up. It's very engaging, with some really fantastic questions being asked as well.
A few housekeeping items - there'll be a Q&A session at the end of the webinar. You can submit questions in Q&A on the right-hand side of your screen and we'll attempt to respond to as many questions as possible during this session. You may need to click on the Q&A icon at the top of your screen to activate the function before submitting any questions. There is no option for attendees to turn on their video or microphone. The session is being recorded though, and will be published on the department's website along with the slides of the session.
I'm going to introduce our speakers for today and our panel members. Our first speaker is going to be Doctor Ameera Yousiph. Ameera is Assistant Director at the Mission Strategy and Implementation section within the Health and Medical Research Office, and she's responsible for managing the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission. She'll be speaking to us about the MRFF, the Mission and the current grant opportunity that this mission will be funding.
Our second speaker is Dr. Merran Stewart, Assistant Director at the Performance and Evaluation section, which is another area within the Health and Medical Research Office, and responsible for the review and evaluation of MRFF programs. Merran will speak about the recent review of the Mission that was conducted and its outcomes.
And our third and final speaker is Genevieve Donnelly, the Assistant Secretary of the Dementia Diversity and Design Branch within the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Genevieve started her career as a pharmacist and has worked across primary, acute, aged care sectors and private, government and not-for-profit organisations. Her career in the public service has spanned a range of agencies, including the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Healthcare, the Australian Digital Health Agency and the Independent Health and Aged Care Pricing Authority before moving to the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Genevieve will be speaking to us today about the dementia policy, the National Dementia Action Plan and the factors that influence and shape policy development in this area.
Joining us today also for the panel is Dr. Jane Reid, who is Director of the Mission Strategy and Implementation Section. As previously mentioned, this is the policy team within the Health and Medical Research Office that looks after all the MRFF Missions, of which there are 8 currently, including the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission. Jane, together with Ameera, will be here to answer any questions you might have about the mission roadmap and implementation plan, as well as about the grant opportunity that's currently live.
So, without further ado, I'm going to hand over to Ameera, who, as I said, will be talking to you about the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission itself and the grant opportunity. Thanks, Ameera.
Ameera Yousiph:
Thank you, Cindy.
First, welcome everyone. I just want to take a moment just to thank you all for attending this morning's webinar. We really appreciate you taking the time to come along and learn about the work that we do here. It's always a pleasure to get to talk about these important bodies of work in the medical research space and talk about some of the great work that is being done via the Missions program in the MRFF.
As Cindy mentioned, during my part of this webinar, I'll be speaking a bit about the MRFF in general, the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission and the current grant opportunity that we have open under that Mission, and I'll also talk a little bit about some highlights of the Mission to date.
OK, so to talk about the Medical Research Future Fund, this fund was established in 2015 and it is a $22 billion long-term investment fund, the proceeds of which currently fund approximately $650 million each year in grants for medical research and medical innovation. The MRFF provides a long-term sustainable source of funding for endeavours that aim to improve health outcomes, quality of life and health system sustainability in the Australian healthcare space.
The MRFF is priority-led and responsive health and medical research funding program and it's delivered from the Health and Medical Research Office in the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. The fund was designed to address strategic National Health priorities which are developed by the independent Australian Medical Research Advisory Board, which we refer to as AMRAB around here, and these priorities were developed following extensive national public consultation.
On our website we have a third ten-year investment plan for the MRFF and this plan provides funding for 22 initiatives between the years 2024 and 2032. Goodness, that sounds far away. To support life-saving research, to create jobs, strengthen the local industry base for commercialising research and innovation, and further grow Australia's reputation as a world leader in medical research.
As I’m sure we all know, developing new drugs for use in the population, developing devices and treatments, for any medical problem can take quite a long time. So, this third ten-year plan aims to give researchers and industry a little bit of certainty and direction so that they may address areas of unmet need in developing their applications for funding and help them to excel in collaborative and transformative research.
Under the MRFF, grants are all assessed by independent committees and grants are awarded based on merit following these assessment processes. The MRFF aims to fund applications which address specific priorities, have transformative potential and are collaborative in nature.
So, what are MRFF Research Missions? Missions are large programs of work with ambitious objectives that are only possible through significant investment, leadership and collaboration. They are currently 10-year programs and we currently have 8 active missions that are working to fund research and we have two that are currently in development. Our research missions tackle significant health challenges by bringing together researchers, health professionals, stakeholders, industry partners and consumers. This joint effort of all these groups supports the discovery of new techniques and treatments that ultimately will lead to healthier Australians.
An Expert Advisory Panel is established for each mission and these panels are set up to advise the Minister for Health on the priority areas for research investment in in the space that the mission is in. The advice that the EAP provide is also transformed into a road map and implementation plan for each mission. These are strategic guidance documents, and they guide the funding decisions for each mission. Each grant opportunity that we offer under any mission program is developed using the priorities in the implementation plan, and we'll speak a little bit more about these documents in the following slides.
The two strategic documents for all missions and again for the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission are the roadmap and implementation plan. The roadmap is a very high level strategic document and this outlines the aim, vision, goal and priorities for investment for the mission. The implementation plan sits under the road map, and this implementation plan details the research required to achieve the goal of the mission as outlined in the road map and how the goal will be evaluated.
Grant opportunities for the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission, as with all missions, are informed and guided by the implementation plan. Having these priorities listed in the implementation plan allows any grant applicant to have a bit of a heads up in anticipating topic areas for funding in future rounds of mission funding. We always encourage researchers to read the implementation plan, along with the grant opportunity guidelines when they're released to thoroughly read them thoroughly to gain a clear understanding of what the Mission wishes to fund and when the Mission plans to fund it. During the grant assessment phase for any opportunity, our grant assessment committees are also provided these documents for reference to help guide them through their assessment. So, these strategic documents are drafted by the Expert Advisory Panel that I mentioned in the last slide and these documents both undergo national public consultation prior to publication. So, it is quite a long process to set them up to make sure that that they are sound and put them up for review. It's also important to highlight that the implementation plan also establishes how each priority for the mission will be evaluated in terms of the Mission meeting its objectives. Merran will be discussing evaluation and the evaluation of the Dementia Ageing and Aged Care Mission in her section of this webinar.
Now on the screen I've got a QR code. If you wish to take a photo of that now, please feel free. This will take you to our webpage where you can download these documents, learn a bit more about them and learn more about their development by the EAP and as Cindy mentioned, these slides will be made available on our website at a later date, so you will be able to get this QR code again.
So, from the implementation plan, what I've put here is the main aims and priority areas for investment for the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission. This is just a snapshot from that document. So as articulated in the roadmap, the goal of the Mission is to improve outcomes for older Australians, and the way that will be achieved is via these three aims. It's probably not super clear, so I'll read them out.
The first aim is to achieve measurable improvements in detection, prevention, assessment, care and support for people living with dementia. This addresses the dementia part of the Mission. The second aim is to achieve measurable improvements in healthy life expectancy amongst older Australians, so taking care of the ageing part of the Mission and the last aim is to achieve measurable improvements in consistency and quality of care for older Australians across all care settings, for the aged care part of the Mission. This implementation plan specifies how investment should be made to achieve these three aims by listing some top-level priority areas for investment as can be seen on the slide next to each aim. And the implementation plan also provides detailed guidance for investment for each priority area. We use this guidance to design each grant opportunity for the Mission. So, this document, as I said previously, is a valuable tool for researchers to see what future calls for research under the Mission will be and help you plan your research accordingly.
OK. So before jumping into a bit more detail about the Dementia Ageing and Aged Care Mission, I thought I would just provide the timeline of the Mission. So, it commenced in 2019. Again, this is a 10-year program of work, and it was commenced with a plan to invest $185 million over 10 years, so up until 2029. So, at the end of last year and the beginning of this year, which is around the midpoint for this Mission, an external provider was engaged to conduct a review of this Mission and this has recently been completed, as Merran will discuss. We currently have the 2025 grant opportunity open. This closes on the 20th of August, so not next Wednesday, the following Wednesday. Further information about this opportunity will be discussed in the next few slides.
So, at this stage, the Mission is planned to operate until 2029. Extension of this mission beyond this point is subject to evaluation and ministerial decision. And again, Merran will discuss the evaluation in her part of the webinar.
Ok, so now we'll look at some more specific details around the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission. So, this Mission will invest $185 million over the 10 years from 2019, to support Australians to live independently and maintain their health for as long as possible in their older years.
Our research funded under this Mission, if I refer to it as the DAAC Mission, that's Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care. So, funding research funded under the DAAC Mission will enable older Australians to maintain their health and quality of life as they age, to live independently for as long as possible, and to access quality care when they need it. These points about healthy ageing, they're important as they enable older people to continue to contribute to the wider community, be that socially, culturally or economically. Healthy ageing also reduces the cost of disease to our society, and it does this by delaying the start of symptoms and it delays that need for really resource intensive health and aged care services. So, a wide range of benefits for the Australian community.
To date, the DAAC Mission has invested around $124 million out of its initial $185 million in around 78 separate grants. So, it's done a lot of work so far, and many excellent research projects have been funded across the areas of Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care via this funding, and I'll discuss a few of these grants over the next few slides to give you an idea of what we fund.
Ok, so the first one I'll go through is one that's focused on the dementia part of the Mission. So, we have a grant titled “Implementing innovative technology, promoting self-awareness of brain health and self-determination in obtaining a timely dementia diagnosis.” This was awarded through the 2021 Dementia Ageing and Age Care Grant opportunity to Professor Alison Hutchinson of Deakin University.
This grant's really interesting in that it will utilise an app to help older people gain an awareness of their own brain health. So, through some activities and things done through this app, it gives you an idea of sort of where you're standing and it gives you the tools to seek medical attention if you feel that you have any cognitive concerns or this app lets you know that there is there is some area of concern there. So seeking this medical attention via this self-help app should help achieve timely diagnosis of dementia and cognitive decline in older Australians and this can be very useful in helping people to access treatments early, again extending those healthy years and delaying the onset of serious illness.
So that's for dementia. I will now talk about an interesting grant, that was awarded in the ageing, so the healthy ageing space of the Mission.
So, this project is titled “Metformin for Treating Peripheral Artery Disease Related Walking Impairment Trial” or the MERIT Grant. This was funded again through the 2021 Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Grant opportunity to Professor Jonathan Golledge of James Cook University.
This project looks at using a very cheap and very accessible medication, Metformin, commonly used for the treatment of diabetes, using this medication to treat blocked leg veins or peripheral artery disease in older Australians.
So, the aim of this project is to, you know, utilise this drug to reduce the effects of these blocked veins, and this will hopefully improve mobility amongst older Australians taking the medication. Again, to help them to maintain their health so they're not suffering with blocked veins in their legs and extend those healthy years for as long as possible and being able to care for themselves as long as possible before needing assistance and this idea, you know, a very cheap and accessible drug, but it can have impacts, positive impacts on older people in Australia and worldwide.
OK, so the last grant, I want to highlight this morning is in the Aged Care section of the Mission. So, this project is titled “Development and Implementation of the National Infection Surveillance Program for Aged Care”, the NISPAC. This was funded through the 2020 Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Opportunity and it was awarded to Associate Professor Noleen Bennett.
So, this project aims to implement an effective infection surveillance program in all Australian Aged Care facilities. The idea behind this project is that it should improve, you know, sanitation and infection control in any Aged Care setting to hopefully reduce infections in the residents. Again, extending those healthy years, improving the health of older Australians and improving the quality of Aged Care across the entire sector, so an interesting project come for the Aged Care space.
OK. So now I'll talk a little bit about the current grant opportunity that we have open under the Dementia Ageing and Aged Care Mission. So, this opened a bit of a while back now. It opened in 29th of February 2025. It will close to applications at 5:00 PM on the 20th of August, so not next week, the following week. It has $24.3 million available in funding. Now there are two streams of funding available. I'll talk about these in the next couple of slides and at this stage outcomes for this opportunity are expected from December, so from the end of the year.
OK. The first stream that we have funding available for this year, it's the objective of this stream is to conduct implementation research focused on addressing inequalities of uptake in prevention activities for vulnerable populations and we've split those populations into three separate topics. So, topic A is for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Topic B is for rural, regional and remote populations, and Topic C is culturally and linguistically diverse populations.
This this stream is heavily focused on prevention activities again to extend those healthy years when you're ageing. Now the outcome, the desired outcome of this stream is implementing interventions that extend healthy active years of life amongst the vulnerable populations listed. Maximum funding available for a single grant, is $3 million, and the maximum grant period is five years for this. And for this stream, you can have up to 15 chief investigators on the grant, and up to 15 associate investigators on the ground.
OK, so stream two that we have funding available for. The objective of this one is to conduct implementation research to understand the barriers and enablers to and impact of the adoption of the key components of high-quality care for older Australians across care settings and population groups. So either by the disease type that they're suffering from, their age group, or other characteristics. So this has a strong focus on the adoption of high-quality care for older Australians.
The outcome that we're looking for here is to improve implementation of best practice care for older Australians. Now these grants offered onto this stream are slightly larger, so the maximum funding available is $5 million for each grant.
The maximum grant period is five years and these can be much larger projects. So, we have up to 50 chief investigators allowed on a grant and up to 50 associate investigators. So these ones should be much larger collaborative research projects.
Now more information on each of these streams is available in the Grant Opportunity Guidelines. These are available on GrantConnect. We encourage our researchers to read through the Guidelines thoroughly along with the implementation plan and use these documents to consider how your proposed research will contribute to the overarching goals of the MRFF and the Mission.
OK. I'll talk a little bit about MRFF grant opportunities. Each grant opportunity in the MRFF is different. We have grant opportunities across, as I said earlier22 initiatives, 10 of those being Missions and they all address unique priorities.
So, when preparing your application for a grant opportunity under the Mission, it's important to consider the objectives of the grant opportunity against the assessment criteria, and all of these are listed in the grant opportunity guidelines. As indicated earlier, the MRFF is a priority-led investment fund. So please read the details provided in the grant guidelines, specifically Section 2.3.
The MRFF requires researchers to identify how their project will contribute to the MRFF measures of success and includes outcomes-focused assessment criteria. The outcomes of your research ideally should be focused on real world impact and should articulate how the impacts and benefits of your research will continue long after your research period has ended. The specifics obviously will depend upon the type of research that you are proposing.
And now under the MRFF, there is a relatively new requirement to include a statement on consumer involvement when applying for a grant. The MRFF strongly encourages the active engagement of consumers in research, and I will discuss consumer involvement a little bit more in the next slide.
OK, so in case people aren't aware, a consumer is a person with lived experience as a patient, client, potential patient or user of services. So, in the DAAC Mission, it would be someone with lived experience around dementia, problems related to ageing or aged care. So the MRFF's consumer reference panel have developed the principles for consumer involvement in research that is funded by the MRFF. There is a link here on the slide and again these will be available for you at a later date. So, all grant opportunities require chief investigators to produce a consumer involvement statement in which applicants describe the involvement of consumers that they've engaged at all stages of their proposed research, including at prioritisation, design, conducting research, dissemination, translation and beyond. Under the MRFF researchers may request some funding for the reasonable costs of supporting their consumers and supporting them for the time that they provide to the research. Consumer involvement with the Dementia Ageing Aged Care Mission can be a little bit more difficult due to cognitive decline associated with dementia, other illnesses and general ageing. Although it is important, here specifically that research about older Australians is done in conjunction with them and not to them or about them without their input. So, we do want to see active engagement of older Australians in proposed research. Consumer engagement here is also critical across the entire research continuum to ensure that active and valuable participation. This means that researchers should actively work with their consumers from the very beginning until far beyond.
OK, um, that's all I really had to talk about this morning. On the slide you will see some ways that you can maintain connection with the MRFF. Again, this will be available online, so please feel free to reach out and we will have the Q&A session at the end. So, if you have any questions, pop them in the Q&A function.
So, thank you for listening to me this morning and I'll now hand you over to Dr Merran Stewart to talk about the review and evaluation. Thank you.
Merran Stewart:
Thanks, Ameera. Hello everyone. I'm Merran Stewart from the Performance and Evaluation Section within the Health and Medical Research Office, and I'm going to take you through the findings from a recent review. So the Performance and Evaluation Section, we're the area with responsibility for review and evaluation of MRFS programs and we do this in accordance with our Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Strategy, and in the strategy in relation to Missions, it outlines that they're reviewed or evaluated in at their midpoint in a way that's proportionate with the size and program size of the program or activity.
Today I'm talking about a recent mid-term review of the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission. And like Ameera, I'm going to use the term DAAC Mission when I'm speaking about this, but the terms DAAC Mission and Mission are used interchangeably in the review and on the slides.
The review was undertaken in 2024 and also this year and it covered investments from inception of the MRFF to August 2024. So, in scope for the review are all MRFF, dementia, ageing and aged care research investments over this time period.
The total funding was $295 million, which you can see in the green, there. In the pie graph you can see it includes 52 grants funded through the DAAC Mission. Then it also involves 74 grants that are other MRFF investments in dementia, ageing and aged care research funded through other MRFF initiatives and they're referred to as non-mission or non DAAC Mission grants. Just one example of these 74 grants is the Curator Dementia and Cognitive Decline program, which is funded under the MRFF Medical Research Commercialisation Initiative. Just a note on scope, the 52 DAAC Mission grants don't include those funded under the 2024 grant opportunity because the outcomes weren't available when the review commenced.
When we're undertaking these reviews, we're looking to answer four questions. The first is around positioning, so how the research we fund sits in the national and international funding landscape? The second is around the contribution that the MRFF funded research has made. The third is around progress and impact. So, what extent there's alignment and progress towards benchmarks and I'll talk about those on the next two slides. Then finally, what opportunities are there to improve the impact of the research that we fund?
The review was conducted by MH Consulting Group, who's an independent contractor and was guided by a mission review panel, and I've listed the panel members on the slide there.
Just back to that review question 3, when we're looking at alignment and progress towards benchmarks, we look at two different levels. The first is at the MRFF level and on the slide here I've shared the conceptual framework for Monitoring and Evaluation of the MRFF and it outlines the broader vision and aims, the impact measures in blue and then you can see the measures of success there. When we're looking at progress towards MRFF benchmarks, we consider these measures of success. Then at the second level is a slide you've just seen from Ameera, we consider progress and alignment towards the DAAC mission benchmarks and we're looking at the aims, priorities and evaluation measures. As Ameera indicated, they can be found in the implementation plan and I didn't put the evaluation measures on the slide just because of space.
So, looking at the inputs to answer those four review questions, the department undertook a desktop scan which reviewed the national and international funders of dementia, ageing and aged care research and identified key learnings and opportunities for the Mission.
The desktop scan also included an analysis of MRFF expenditure, so for example funding by state and territory or by priority area. Documentation such as progress and final reports are also inputs into the review and MH Consulting Group undertook grantee and stakeholder survey as well as stakeholder interviews to obtain views on the DAAC mission and information about projects. Grantees have also been asked about outcomes and impacts of their projects via a separate performance indicator survey and relevant data from that input was included as part of this review. I've just listed some of the organisations that were engaged for consultation on the slide here, and the full list is in the review report. I just wanted to briefly, as we may have a number of grantees in the audience, thank those who have taken the time to complete review surveys they do provide important information for us.
I want to spend the remainder of my time taking you through an overview of the review findings. More details can be found in the review report, which will be published on the department's website soon, and I've got a link at the end of my slides.
So, in relation to review question one, the MRFF position in the funding landscape, the review found that the MRFF is the second highest funder of dementia, ageing and aged care research nationally behind the NHMRC. It also found that the MRFF has the highest average grant size of national funders we looked at, which was shown on the slide here, and it was also the case for the majority of international funders that were looked at.
The review found that the DAAC Mission priority areas for investment are broadly aligned with priorities of major national and international funders, and that the mission stands out for its specific emphasis on improving aged care models, which was an area less predominant in other funding body.
The characteristics of other funders included different priorities such as research, capacity and workforce, the inclusion of women and people with disability as priority populations, formal co-funding partnerships and support for EMCR and clinician researchers, as well as funding models to support translation.
So, these are findings that the DAAC Mission can consider, noting that some of these may be addressed by other MRFF initiatives. The review also found that the DAAC Mission outlines a broader and more specific set of priority populations and takes a strong approach to consumer engagement.
Now looking at review question two, MRFF contribution. MRFF investment in dementia, ageing and aged care related research has attracted approximately $22 million in co-funding and the focus of MRFF funded research spans those three domains of dementia, ageing and aged care, which I've shown on the slide here, and 75% of projects reported involvement of at least one DAAC Mission priority population. However, some priority populations do remain underrepresented.
The review found that the DAAC Mission is a critical mechanism to bridge the funding gap between basic research, predominantly funded by the NHMRC, and later stage translation and commercialisation. So consistent with the MRFF's focus on translation, the majority of projects are positioned towards the later stages of the research translation pipeline, as determined by CIA self-report, and I've shown on the figure here.
The review also looked at the broad research areas of grants funded by the MRFF and NHMRC and found that the MRFF made almost no investment into basic science research, which is shown in dark blue in the pie graphs, and that rather we funded a higher proportion of health services research, which is the dark grey.
Then looking at review question three, progress of funded research. This was a midterm review, so at the time of the review only 2% of DAAC Mission and 18% of non DAAC Mission projects were complete. Good progress was evident with 27% of projects reporting they'd completed or were near completing the relevant DAAC Mission benchmark and then looking at still review question 3, but alignment of funded research. The review found that projects are distributed across all almost all priority areas for investment as shown in the figure here.
The review found that stakeholders had mixed views of the DAAC Mission priorities, including around the interconnectedness of dementia, ageing and aged care. There was broad agreement that research priorities set in 2019 when the implementation plan was developed may need to be updated in light of recent policy and system developments, so for example, the findings of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety and the National Dementia Action Plan Priority Research Areas, and we'll hear more about the action plan from Genevieve next.
So now looking at progress of funded research against the MRFF measures of success, the review found that individual projects are progressing at different stages, but overall, it remains early days in demonstrating outcomes against the measures of success, as would be expected for the stage of completion of many of the projects in scope.
Seventy-nine percent of projects reported progress towards increased focus on areas of unmet need, and 53% of projects involved at least one clinical trial, with 57 trials in total expected to enrol 21,000 participants.
A total of 578 researchers were supported through MRFF funded dementia, ageing and aged care research projects, including in a broad range of roles, and more than half of them were early to mid-career researchers.
The review also found that most funded projects have used strategies to involve consumers, with involvement on advisory groups and in priority setting and co-design being the most common as shown in the figure here. Approximately $7 million in co-funding from industry has been secured, with some promising early signs of commercialisation and innovative partnership models.
A number of projects have made significant progress towards embedding new health technologies and interventions into place, with early outcomes including repurposing, advancing or improving access to treatments, technologies and interventions.
Many of the grantees and also interviewees raised the challenges of translating outcomes of successful research into practice.
In relation to review question 4, the review identified opportunities under four themes for the DAAC mission to consider. It was recognised that some of these opportunities are specific to the MRFF, and others are broader in nature and would require coordination across the sector. In relation to what research is conducted, the review identified three opportunities related to the DAAC Mission priorities that I've briefly touched on.
Opportunities for how research is funded include strengthening collaboration and coordination and also translation requirements, as well as addressing underfunded and emerging priorities. Strengthening end-user engagement and enhancing communication were opportunities identified for how research is conducted and used respectively. The outcomes from this DAAC Mission review will be used by the department to inform future grant opportunities under the DAAC Mission alongside the existing implementation plan.
I'm going to leave you with, this list of recent review activities, noting that the Dementia Ageing and Aged Care Mission review is not yet published on the website. We have a Q&A session at the end of this session today, so please, put any questions for me in the Q&A and I believe I'm passing to Cindy next.
Cindy Thamrin:
Thanks very much, Merran. We are running a little bit short on time, so please do post your questions and we'll try and answer them on the chat as much as we can. But having heard now about the Mission and the research that we fund the MRFF, we're going to move on to the second part of the webinar. We're very privileged to have Genevieve Donnelly speak to us today. As I said, Genevieve's the head of the Dementia, Diversity and Design branch, and she'll speak to us about government priorities for dementia and the challenges of putting dementia policy into practice. Thanks very much, Genevieve.
Genevieve Donnelly:
Thank you, Cindy, and thank you everyone for the opportunity to present today. I do apologise in advance as I navigate a bit of a virus, so do forgive me if I mute throughout if that's OK today. As Cindy said, my role within the department is as the Assistant Secretary for Dementia, Diversity and Design Branch. And while policy responsibility that sits within the DAAC Mission is shared across many parts of the department, quite a significant part of the policy element is the responsibility of my team and very particularly we'll be talking about the dementia today and the things that are shaping our policy thinking within the department.
I don't want to rehash, what many of you probably already know, but dementia is a significant and growing area of concern and disease burden for Australia, and we're looking down the tunnel of those numbers doubling, within the next thirty-five odd years. It's already our second leading cause of death and leading cause for women, and three to five times more likely in First Nations populations. But from a policy perspective, it's also really important to keep in mind that we what we know from The Lancet Commission on dementia last year that globally 45% of cases can be prevented or delayed by addressing 14 modifiable risk factors across the life course of the population. With an ageing population in Australia though, we do know that we are going to see increased numbers over the coming years. And making sure that we have an evidence-based approach to how we inform our policy and implement it is going to be a critical part of that.
In recognition of this being a really important and growing policy issue for government, the Commonwealth Government partnered with all states and territories to develop the National Dementia Action Plan. This was done over the course of a number of years and is the primary policy framework for dementia nationally.
It was released in December of last year and outlines our strategic direction for the next 10 years through to 2034. And as Professor Brodaty reminded us at Press Club recently, Australia back in the 1990s was the first country to have a National Dementia Action Plan.
This plan has been informed by extensive research and consultation across not just dementia and people living with dementia, but their carers, families, researchers and clinicians. It sets out where we want to be in 10 years time and what the priorities are in order for us to get there, to ensure that we have an inclusive and supportive community for people living with dementia to live in. The action plan has 8 high level actions to support this vision and it's aimed at increasing dementia awareness, reducing the population's risk of developing dementia, improving diagnosis and treatment, driving better and more coordinated services for people living with dementia, their carers and families. And when you have a look at this plan, if you haven't, I would certainly encourage you to check it out. Each of these priority areas and actions has a number of sub-elements below it that really specify what is included within the scope of it.
While research is high in its own right under Action 8, it's also important to recognise that its role in helping to shape policy is touched on in all of the actions that we have included. For instance, under Action 3, there's a focus on reducing risk, which recognises the growing body of research on modifiable risk factors in this area and how we can delay and prevent dementia where possible and the actions that people can take.
During the development of this action plan, we heard quite significantly about the challenges in translating evidence-based research into practice and in particular, where that impacted some groups more than others, such as those living with a high risk of dementia or those facing barriers to access of services and supports. And as we heard in Merran’s presentation, that was very much touched on in the review as well and is a future area of focus. Our branch considers this and the research in our policy and practice, and that's core to how we go about developing our policy.
From the perspective of a person living with dementia, I think it's worth just sort of flipping it and having a think about how they engage with the care and services that they need in their lived experience of dementia. And that means that often they're moving across not just health and aged care, but the general care environment and normal services that lots of us would engage with normally as well. The challenge in this is that responsibility for the delivery of those services, the shape and the direction of them doesn't just sit with any one government or one level of government. Sometimes these can sit with federal, or state and territory, or be a joint responsibility. And so that is part of the challenge that we face from a policy perspective is where those lines of responsibility are and often where there is that joint responsibility or funding as well.
For example, one just to sort of highlight this is where aged care in particular and the regulation of the aged care sector sits very much with the Australian government as primary responsibility, but is in most cases delivered from a private sector perspective.
State and territory governments manage and administer public hospitals and memory clinics that fall within these, but it is a joint funding exercise between state and territories and the federal government, and so the plan in coming together seeks to balance that and recognise the contribution that each government has in taking forward dementia policy and plan.
More importantly, now it's good to have a plan, but how do you implement it and what does that look like? Often a plan isn't worth much unless it does cause action on the ground. And so the agreement with the National Dementia Action Plan is that it will be underpinned by collective priority frameworks that will highlight which of those actions will be the priority across all stakeholders for the coming three to four years and how we will align our actions to make sure that we are transparent and accountable to it and that we can flag what it is that we are doing in each of those spaces.
It also helps to acknowledge that it is a shared responsibility. So the first of the collective priority frameworks is due to be released at the end of this year and it will set out what those priority actions are, what some of those actions are that we already have at the moment that we're putting in place as stakeholders and, following that, every year look to report on the progress of those different actions.
I might just very, very briefly add because I know that we are up against time. In terms of how funding looks from a government perspective, and this may be something that some of you know or are aware of, our funding approach within the department is through the annual budget cycle. Government put up policy proposals and looking at how we shape the case for what is an efficient and effective and appropriate use of government funds to prioritise what will seek government funding and budget allocation for the year - this is a separate process to the collective priority framework, but certainly these really important policy documents that underpin the direction inform what it is that goes into those budget requests. It's also important to know that we are balancing quite a lot across the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing, but also within the ageing and aged care group as well. And so in terms of budget requests, it sort of fits within that broader context. It's really important that whatever we put up, we're demonstrating how it improves the situation, whether that be outcomes or the efficiency of care delivery or achieving those strategic goals of government.
I might just pause there. I have included two pieces for you just in case you're interested. The first is the National Dementia Action Plan, so please do check it out if you haven't already. There is also a link to the dementia area on the department's website and keep an eye out for the collective Priority Framework, which should be coming up later this year. Thank you.
Cindy Thamrin:
Thank you very much, Genevieve, for that. And thanks for persevering despite your bug. Really appreciate it. So, I'll now invite all speakers to the virtual podium. I know we are almost at time, but hopefully the team's been fantastic at fielding all the questions that have been posted on the Q&A chat and we're hoping at least to answer a lot of them by the chat, but we'll hopefully be able to have enough time to address some questions that would be of general interest. So, the one question that has come up and I think this one would be for the Missions team is: when can I expect the next grant opportunity after the 2025 one?
I guess I'll hand that over to either Ameera or Jane.
Ameera Yousiph:
Yep, I can take that, Cindy. So, following the closure of the 2025 opportunity and the outcomes being released, I believe at this stage we're looking at a 2027 opening for an opportunity, it is likely to be the last opportunity under the current Mission, so it should be substantial in value at this stage.
Cindy Thamrin:
Thanks very much, Ameera. There is a question around, uh, oh, excuse, apologies. I think this one is, um, for Merran. Thank you for the presentation. What will you be your final recommendation regarding the Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission. Will it continue or will it change? Over to you, Merran.
Merran Stewart
Thank you, Cindy, and thank you for the question. So yes, as outlined in the third ten-year investment plan, extension of the Missions beyond their original 10 years is subject to evaluation. The review that I spoke about today is a mid-term review of the DAAC Mission. The department has now commenced an evaluation of the MRFF Research Missions theme, and that will help inform government decision on future funding strategies for the DAAC Mission. The evaluation will be overseen by an independent panel and stakeholders will have the opportunity to provide feedback during the process, with outcomes from this evaluation expected in mid-2026. Thanks Cindy.
Cindy Thamrin:
Thanks, Merran. There is a question which I think is actually a couple of questions. Can I or sorry, can or should consumers be included as CIs or chief investigators on applications? Is this common? I believe that would be a question for Jane and Ameera, please.
Jane Reid:
Yes, we strongly encourage consumers being included as CIs on applications and we have been seeing this happening with an increasing frequency throughout the MRFF. Ameera spoke to you a little bit about the consumer involvement statement, and one of the things that we would expect to see in your consumer involvement statement is mention of whether you have consumer CIs included in the team, because that is something we strongly encourage researchers to do.
Cindy Thamrin:
Thanks very much, Jane. There's a question here I believe, which is more appropriate for Genevieve to answer, which is, can you speak more to the timing of the collective priority frameworks? Should I wait to see which framework includes actions that align to my area of research before applying for a grant?
Over to you, Genevieve.
Genevieve Donnelly:
Thank you. Yeah, it is a bit of a tricky one. I think the timing of some of these processes don't quite align and I would certainly encourage people to progress and not wait for the collective priority framework. These frameworks will be released every three to four years over the next decade and while it underpins the priority areas, it should not preclude people continuing to do work in other areas and progressing really important research. So yes, a bit of a timing issue with the different streams, but certainly do continue to apply.
Cindy Thamrin:
Thanks, Genevieve. And don't go away yet because, I think there's a related question there. From a policy-making perspective, what should researchers consider when they're designing their research or evaluation projects?
Genevieve Donnelly:
I think most importantly, the National Dementia Action Plan is a critical component. That's what's going to drive our direction over the next 10 years from a policy perspective. The other thing to keep in mind is that responsibility and where different things sit and whether that is something that sits within the remit of the jurisdictions and their responsibility within the Commonwealth Government and how that engagement occurs to translate it from research into policy. The other is to look at really effective ways to communicate the benefit of the research. And so how do we pilot these programs and really prove them up within care delivery environments from a policy perspective as well. And so I would certainly encourage people to have a look at those elements as they're looking at the translation.
Cindy Thamrin:
Thanks very much Genevieve, and thank you to all our speakers and panel members for taking the time to present and also answer the questions. We are at time. The team has tried to answer as many questions as possible in the Q&A chat, but you can see on the screen e-mail addresses for the MRFF and for the Dementia, Diversity and Design branch respectively. It's also a good reminder to note that when you have questions that are more specific to the grant platform, those questions should be directed to the grant hub, which in this case is NHMRC. They will be able to provide you with the more specific information about the application process etc., as they administer the grant opportunity on the MRFF's behalf. So, thank you again, everybody, for joining us. It's great to hear all the questions and also obviously from our speakers as well. And we hope that this will go towards efforts of getting researchers more aware of the MRFF, but also about the dementia landscape and government priorities, and also some of the considerations for translation. Really appreciate it and hope to see you at our next webinar. Bye-bye.